April 3 — in the United States, the regular transcontinental mail service known as the Pony Express began operating. It ran between the small town of St. Joseph, Missouri—considered the last “outpost of civilization” before the Wild West—and Sacramento, the capital of California. Couriers worked “day and night, winter and summer” and carried mail with a total weight of up to 75 kilograms. A courier’s gear included two Colt revolvers, a badge, a hunting knife, and a saddlebag with a pocket at each corner holding the mail load. The pockets were locked; the keys were kept at the start and at the end of the route. The service recruited young men able to stay firmly in the saddle and willing to risk their lives for 100 dollars a month—roughly equivalent to about 2,500 dollars in today’s money. Couriers covered a route of about 3,100 kilometers across rugged terrain, with horse-change stations roughly every 16 kilometers, in 10 days. At each station, the courier had 2 minutes to dismount, remove the bag from the saddle, throw it onto a fresh mustang, and ride on. Mailing cost 10 dollars per ounce (31 grams).
Because of the high cost of preparatory work, as well as bandit attacks and the rapidly developing telegraph technology, the company was ultimately ruined.
In 1859, the Governor-General of Eastern Siberia, N. N. Muravyov-Amursky, discovered a convenient bay in Peter the Great Gulf.
He proposed naming it Golden Horn and ordered a military post to be established there, which was given the name Vladivostok.
July 2 — the warship Manchur, commanded by Captain-Lieutenant Alexey Shefner, entered Golden Horn Bay. Three officers and 37 soldiers landed on shore and began construction of the post.
In 1871, the Russian government decided to move Russia’s main Pacific port from Nikolayevsk-on-Amur to Vladivostok.